LUANDA, June 5 (Xinhua) -- Angola's HIV prevalence rate stands at 1.6 percent, according to data from the country's latest health indicators survey, a health official has said.
Speaking Thursday on the sidelines of a provincial HIV/AIDS forum in Saurimo, the capital of Lunda-Sul Province, Lucia Furtado, director of the National Institute for the Fight against AIDS, said the figures are based on a health indicators survey conducted by the National Statistics Institute between 2023 and 2024.
"Two out of every 100 citizens are living with the disease," she said.
According to Furtado, border provinces continue to record some of the highest HIV prevalence rates in the country, led by Lunda-Sul at 4.9 percent, followed by Lunda-Norte at 4.4 percent, Cunene at 3.3 percent and Moxico at 2.9 percent.
Furtado said about 370,000 people are living with HIV/AIDS in Angola, including 240,000 women, among them around 27,000 pregnant women.
Although she did not provide specific figures, Furtado said both HIV-related deaths and the incidence of new infections have declined over the past decade. ■